A thought occurred to her, and she didn’t like it. What if this whole thing was a setup from the start? As in, the judge knew that Wallace would come looking for her, so she asked Madison to stay to act as a sort of decoy. That wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment decision like it seemed. But premeditated. She had scrubbed her home of personal mementos because she had something to hide. No. Too paranoid.
Yet the thought nagged at her.
It was wrong to pry, to rummage through Judge Conroy’s personal effects trying to ferret out her secrets. That would be an abuse of the trust the judge had placed in her. Unless, of course, that trust was itself a ruse. She couldn’t stop thinking about Wallace at the door. His anger, his borderline violence. The judge had been looking over her shoulder all through dinner. She knew Wallace would come for her, which meant she intentionally put Madison in a dangerous situation. And what about Danny? How much danger was he in because of these people?
She flicked open the photos on her phone and looked at pictures of her brother. He’d been trying to get his act together when the world turned on him. It was terrible judgment to go to that bar. But one mistake shouldn’t be a death sentence. His freedom, his very life, hung in the balance. She couldn’t afford to ignore the voice in her head telling her that something was rotten in Judge Conroy’s world. She had to investigate. It was the right thing to do.
She got up and walked around the living room, not exactly sure what she was looking for. A blinking red light up near the ceiling caught her eye. It was one of those motion sensors, but suddenly she thought, That could be a camera. She shouldn’t do anything suspicious within range of its creepy red eye. She put her coffee cup in the sink and headed up the stairs, pausing outside the judge’s bedroom. There was another motion sensor on the landing. It was probably nothing, but she could manufacture an alibi, just in case.
“Lucy? Are you in there, girl?” she called, for the benefit of whoever might be listening, before she ventured inside.
In the master suite, she checked for motion sensors. There were none in there, so she was free to search. She went through the nightstands, the desk, the antique armoire, the decorative chest. Strikeout. Under the bed. The luxurious dressing room. The bathroom cabinets. Nothing unusual. She felt bad doing it and thought she ought to stop. But first, she googled “where to hide evidence” to make sure she hadn’t overlooked anything. Inside the water tank of the toilet, it said. That seemed far-fetched; but just to be sure, she put her phone down and set about lifting off the lid. Lucy ran in and jumped up on the toilet seat, staring accusingly.
“I’m doing this for my peace of mind,” Madison told her.
She lifted it up. There was a plastic bag taped to the underside, full of cash.
Fuck.
She sat down on the edge of the tub and put her head between her knees. Did it have to mean something bad? Maybe the judge just didn’t trust banks.
She had to keep looking.
It took another hour of searching to find the two photo albums, hidden in an old suitcase at the back of a closet. The first one was white satin with a tulle bow on the front. A wedding album. Not the sort of thing your average person would squirrel away, but then again, the judge’s husband had been murdered. Maybe her wedding photos were too painful to look at? Though there was one on her bedside table.
She sat on the dusty floor, turning pages. The photos were sharp and bright, like they’d been taken yesterday. The judge, exquisite in a white silk gown with flowers in her hair. Her husband tall and gorgeous. Both of them looking blissfully happy, with no inkling of the tragedy to come. But it was a photo from the dance floor that made her stop and gasp. Judge Conroy, dancing with Raymond Logue on her wedding day. The dirty lawyer. That was him, she was certain. Burly, red-faced, thinning white hair. She’d seen his photo online, and besides, this man matched her mother’s description of Danny’s lawyer to a T.
She went through every crowd scene and found Logue in several more. He wasn’t just someone Judge Conroy knew from work, then. He was a friend. A close enough friend to invite to her wedding. That seemed suspicious in itself. Guilt by association was a thing for a reason.
The second album was yellowed with age, full of childhood and school photos of the judge. Wow, she wasn’t kidding. She had been awkward as a kid. The pictures weren’t relevant to Madison’s investigation, however. She shouldn’t indulge her base curiosity.
As she went to put the album back in the suitcase, several photos fell out from between the pages. Shit. They’d been loose in there. If she didn’t put them back in the right order, Judge Conroy might figure out she’d snooped. She gathered them up, kicking herself for not being more careful.